


Rose Trellis

by flappergirlsfolly



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-04
Updated: 2014-05-04
Packaged: 2018-01-21 21:19:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,947
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1564454
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flappergirlsfolly/pseuds/flappergirlsfolly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for a friend's prompt: "Ned and Cat are all cute and stuff, Jon has a really bad day so Ygritte goes all cute too."</p>
<p>It's all his family's fault.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rose Trellis

**Author's Note:**

> Posting this for a friend- not my best work, but it was a lot of fun to write. I hope you enjoy!

It all started that morning, when he was almost too busy balancing his Biology books on his raised knee to notice Joffrey Baratheon dolloping a strawberry milkshake on Sansa’s head.

With her horrified screech, Elinor and Megga seemed to vanish into the crowd, as if they never been beside her- that girl who Joffrey _dumped_. They were almost late for maths, sitting on the floor of the girl’s bathroom as he wiped pink gloop from her hair and face with a bit of wadded up toilet paper. He’d given her his flannel to wear (leaving him in the slightly less comfortable t-shirt and hoddie), which she pursed her lips at, but exchanged for her sopping blouse anyway.

History went south in the middle of the Baratheon revolution (metaphorically and literally, Jon silently congratulated himself) when Robb and Theon’s silent slap war suddenly (and explosively) escalated into a fight about that-thing-that-happened-last-Thursday and before he knew it, his brother’s shoe made contact with Jon’s face as he dove on Theon. After managing to pry Robb away from his mate with Arianne’s help, Theon’s waving fist managed to find her neck, resulting in the guy having a chair thrown at him. Unfortunately, the Mr Renly seemed to think that both the bruised boys and innocent parties were involved in some sort of planned class disruption plot and therefore they all deserved to stay back at break to _have a little chat_. (He didn’t even tell them off, just tried to convey something through a string of creative metaphors while they nodded in befuddled agreement- it was a shame that publishing houses wouldn’t take Renly’s novel)

After a torturous morning, his swift feet gladly took him through the halls to the art room, where finally a knot of tension in his shoulders eased as he cast aside his hoodie and picked up his charcoal, turning to his canvas before-

The doors crashed open with a dramatic thump, and nobody other than his brother Bran whizzed through them in his wheelchair, his friend Jojen balancing on the back with his arms extended like Christ the Redeemer. It would have been okay if they’d whizzed right back out again (and the CD player in Bran’s lap hadn’t been blasting ‘Bad Boy For Love’), rather than circling the room a few times and crashing into the store cupboard doors. After hurling them both to their feet and rushing them to Health Care (which Mr Baratheon had dubbed ‘The Wellness Centre’ under his wife’s influence, even if it did call to pretentiousness a little) and dragging them back to their classroom, the bell had gone and the Mr Varys had locked the art room doors, Jon’s hoodie lying tantalizingly behind the glass.

Sitting without his jumper in the courtyard through lunch was painfully cold, especially seeing as though Ygritte was running laps of the building with the girl’s soccer team. (They were meeting after school, but that was _five hours_ from now) His salami sandwich was halfway to his mouth when Arya hurtled through their group, kicking Grenn in the head and collecting his lunch in her mouth as she ran. Her friends followed close behind, Hot Pie taking his packet of little Oreos, Lommy whisking away his muesli bar and Gendry his juice box.

“I hate kids.” He muttered, as Sam and Gilly began snogging noisily.

After lunch delivered the dreaded double chemistry lesson, before he finally managed to retrieve his hoodie- stained wet form a puddle of jaw-clenchingly yellow ink.

Finally, after an eternity, the bell rang and Jon had leapt out of his seat and vaulted over a table in his rush to get to the door. Making a beeline for Ygritte’s bus shelter, he spotted her mess of orange hair and even heard her snorting laugh before-

“JON! JON!”

And Robb’s phone hit him in the face.

_“Can you walk the kids home? You’ll need to pick up Rickon from Shireen’s place, Cat and I are very busy.”_ His dad told him in a flurry of words before giggling like a child and hanging up.

“Why can’t you do it?” he asked his brother as he handed back his phone.

“Theon and I are going to the movies with Jeyne and Jeyne- sorry!”

Robb spirited himself away before he could protest, and when he turned around Ygritte was already waving goodbye to him as she climbed the steps in the bus. He hoarded up his siblings (roughly shoving some Reeds off Bran’s chair, as they determinedly clambered back like Gollum on Mount Doom) and their assorted friends, fuming, before beginning to push the people-laden wheelchair to the Mr Stannis’ house. By the time they found the doorstep at the end of the stretching driveway, his arms were aching and his back felt like a plank of wood. He told the kids to wait (“We’re not dogs, Jon!”) as he rang the doorbell, panting heavily.

Selyse raised her eyebrows at him pointedly, and he waved his finger about in the air as if to indicate the distance between here and school. Rolling her eyes, she opened the wire mesh door and leaned against the frame in her tracksuit.

“Your brother won’t leave- he’s attached himself to the table leg and won’t let go.”

With an exhalation of patience, Jon carefully wiped his feet on the doormat under Selyse’s hawk like eye, before treading his way to the kitchen where Rickon and Shireen sat on the floor.

Even for a family member’s face, Rickon would not relinquish his hold on the table, determinedly clutching tighter and tighter, despite every bribe that passed Jon’s lips, until finally he cracked and shouted “Rickon Stark, if you don’t come with me right now, so help me gods I will carry you out of this house with my bare hands!”

“Bye Shireen!” he cried from over Jon’s shoulder as he all but ran to the door. The walk from the Baratheon’s to Winterfell was even longer than from school, especially pushing three people in a wheelchair with an extra child on his back and a thirteen-year-old setting the pace with skinny limbs and salami at the corners of her mouth.

But at long last he rammed the chair up the ramp at home and fumbled for his keys, Sansa whining that she had to wash her hair and Gendry needing to pee.

And as the door swung open, the family became exceedingly well acquainted with exactly what was keeping Dad and Catelyn busy.

An hour later, as the sounds of Arya and Meera bashing each other up with plastic light sabres battled into his room (“come join us, Jon, it’s fun!”), he scrupulously cleaned his teeth, found a clean jumper and flannel and stomped his feet into his boots before clomping down the stairs to the front door.

“Excuse me, but where do you think you’re going?”

Dad appeared from the kitchen with a silver Ikea mixing bowl cradled in the crook of his arm.

“Ygritte and I were going to get dinner at the diner tonight- I told you about it, you said it was okay.”

“Change of plan, family night.” He called over his shoulder as he rushed back into the kitchen.

_“Family night?”_ Jon repeated, incredulous as he followed, “What- I’ve been having a day with too much family, let alone a family night-“

“Family comes first.” Catelyn reinforced. “I’m sorry, but you’re going to have to call Ygritte and cancel.”

“But-“

“Family night!” she shouted, jabbing a stick of asparagus to the hallway.

“And I’ve taken your key from your schoolbag!” Ned called as Jon stomped up the stairs. “So don’t even think about-“

He was cut off as Jon slammed his bedroom door and hit the ‘play’ button on his stereo.

Thankfully, Ygritte didn’t want to skin him for cancelling, and he spent the next two hours groaning as the younger ones fight over whether to watch Shrek or Frozen or Snow Dogs for the _billionth_ time after dinner.

“Why don’t you just call her and get her to come here?” Sansa asked unhelpfully.

“No romantic appendages on family night.” Ned recited, “Friends yes, girlfriends, no.”

“That’s so archaic- I think it would be cute! Besides, Robb and Theon aren’t even _here_!”

“What a well rounded point, Sansa.” Jon remarked enthusiastically, before turning to Ned with a hopeful smile.

“You’ll miss Shrek.” Is all he said, with a gleefully malicious smirk.

* * *

It’s not even remotely fair, he thought to himself and he collapsed face down onto his mattress. He wanted to punch his pillow, imagining the faces of his family, but if he’s honest, one bad day against he and Arya playing soccer in the backyard on weekend and soaking up residual alcohol with pancakes beside Robb outweighs a bruised cheek and one crap day.

Though he wouldn’t mind bruising his dad’s face, he reflected, picking bits of popcorn out of his hair-

_Tap, tap, tap._

Blinking, he glanced about the room, frowning.

_Tap, tap, tap._

What was that?

_Tap, tap- scuff, shuffle,_ and a spat hiss of _“shit!”_

Leaping out of bed he ran to the window, hurling it open as hastily as he could without letting out the tell tale ‘skreeee!’ and helped tug Ygritte through. The rose trellis rustled as her weight left it, clambering carefully over his bookshelf and landed on top of him. He staggered slightly, but righted himself, smiling down at her impish grin.

“What are you doing?” he asked through his gleeful beam, sharing a brief kiss.

“You had a shit day.” She replied, as if it were obvious, kissing him again.

“You didn’t have to scale a building- I could have come to yours-“

“Figured I’d surprise you with something cute.”

“What?” he asked, frowning. Snorting with laughter, she tapped his nose patronisingly.

“You know nothing, Jon Snow.” She grinned impishly, slapping her own backside, before locking her arms around his neck and leaping up to throw her legs around his middle.

* * *

“Ned.” 

From his newspaper, Ned’s eyes found his wife, who was standing in her green robe in the hallway between the foyer and the kitchen. Warmth rushed through him at the sight, until her hasty beckons pulled him from his breakfast and up the stairs. 

“What is it?” he whispered, as she pressed a finger to her lips, her hand tightening around the handle to Jon’s bedroom door, and cracked it open. 

His eyes took a moment to adjust to the darkness, but after a long moment he was able to decipher the form of his sleeping son, bundled up on his mattress. 

Wrapped around a girl who definitely hadn’t been in the house the night before. 

Carefully, Cat closed the door and looked at him pointedly. 

“What do we do?” she murmured. “I’ll wake her up and-“ 

“Leave her.” He replied. “You saw him last night- he could use a break.” 

_“Ned-“_

“It’d be a bit hypocritical of us to punish them, after yesterday afternoon.” he mused, watching colour rise in her cheeks. 

“Oh gods… do you think they’ll be all right?” 

“As long as their friends don’t tell their parents.” He conceded, biting his lip. 

“I’m going to get Hodor to take that rose trellis down.” She decided, after a moment. 

“What for?” he asked, as they leaned on each other, loping down the stairs. 

“Oh, I don't know. Maybe so she can’t break into our house at night?” 

“Who?” 

“Ygritte- oh, Ned, no.” 

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” He said, lightly, walking into the kitchen, humming with a smile. 

“You’re a romantic fool, Ned Stark!” Cat called from behind him. 

“You’re the one who married me.”


End file.
